When I was younger, we almost never made it to my grandparents place for Christmas (both sets lived 12 hours drive away, and my mother does NOT travel well.) Mom and Dad would take pictures of us on christmas morning and mail them out with our thank you notes. Well, by the time I was four, my Grandmothers had gotten tired of seeing me on the fridge in whatever ratty jammies I'd gone to bed in on Christmas Eve.

Grandma A was a seamstress, so she made me a pair of nice red and white jammies and told my parents I had to wear them Christmas eve. The pictures turned out so nice, that the other Grandma (Grandma B) kept up the tradition, sending us pajamas for our Christmas Eve present. It was the only gift we were allowed to open, and we always knew it was pajamas, but still we never knew exactly what she'd found (she didn't sew, so they were store bought). It didn't always work out, like the hot pink silk nightgown that had an unexpectedly low V neck (I wore a black shirt underneath, and my mother teased her over the phone about it. She'd not noticed, just thought the colour was nice LOL) but the pictures always looked good enough for the fridge, so both Grandma's were happy.

Our other tradition was we were not allowed out of bed till 7, and then could only open the stocking. Presents had to wait till after we'd had breakfast. (And yes, they tortured us by making waffles and bacon instead of letting us eat toast, haha).

My current gift tradition is that I don't do Christmas cards, and I do very few gifts. Instead, I make truffles, package them in the tiniest size of brown paper bag, and give them instead. My truffle list is shorter than a Christmas card list would be, but longer than a gift list would be. There's no fussing about buying cards and writing little messages in them, or having picture cards made, or buying the perfect gift for fifteen people every year. I have to recalculate how much chocolate to buy every year, but that's the most thought I have to put into it. People get a little present from me that they can enjoy, and then it's gone and they don't have to store or dust it, and I'm told some look forward to it every year.

I started off making two flavors and forming them by hand. Then when I started dating my now-husband, he got in on things and we made more flavors and streamlined the process. Now we do somewhere between three and six flavors, and one has to be hot stuff.

I've been doing this for about fifteen years now, and I'm quite happy with it.

We don't do Christmas cards, but an Epiphany letter. That gives us an extra week to get it out . Once we tried to not do a family letter and MIL called to say that there were complaints that cousin or aunt so-in-so didn't get one. After 20+ years in the Army our Christmas card list was crazy long. We began only sending a letter to those who sent us a card. It helped trim the list.

For several years we had the DSs spread the gift opening over the 12 days of Christmas. Beginning Christmas day they opened the big things and then over the next 12 days opened the smaller gifts they received from aunts and uncles. On January 6th they had the last big gift. It helped when things were late in the mail or the latest, hottest thing was out of stock until New Year's.

Cabbage's and my grandma gives Mom, Cabbage, and me each a new ornament for our trees every year (Mom and Dad have one tree, and Cabbage and I have the other). She gives them to us before we eat Thanksgiving lunch, and then we put them on the trees on Friday when we decorate. This year, Grandma gave me an angel ornament with holly sprigs on its dress.

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"It takes a great deal of courage to stand up to your enemies, but even more to stand up to your friends" - Harry Potter

We are an "open gifts on Christmas day" kind of family. The kids always ask if they can open one gift on Christmas Eve. That one gift is chosen by the adults and it's always PJs so the Christmas morning pictures look really nice. It took years for the kids to realize that they always got the same early gift (except for the youngest, who recently asked her mother if Grandy was giving them PJs to wear on Christmas Eve).

:)How could I forget!! We love the Advent Calendars with the little chocolates behind the windows opened everyday of December until Christmas. Getting them out of the cupboard now - I buy them as soon as they hit the stores.